Monday, June 22, 2009

Gov. Paterson plans to call a special session of the Senate on Tuesday so that legislators can take up time-sensitive issues like tax and school reform. He has also indicated that the marriage equality bill is part of his agenda.

In the Huffington Post, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand writes that she is “firmly committed to repealing Don't Ask Don't Tell.”

The New York State Bar Association adopted a resolution over the weekend in support of marriage equality.

New York labor leader Stuart Appelbaum, a Pride Agenda Board Director, writes on Huffington Post about his reasons for recently coming out: “I have always believed that the only way to challenge injustice is by organizing people for change. That's why I first became involved in the labor movement. But change also requires being honest with each other and ourselves. For me, that means recognizing that the time has long passed for me to step forward and say: ‘yes, I'm gay.’ I'm sure to some that may seem ‘in your face.’ To me, though, it's being who I am.”

The Legislative Gazette talks to former Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno about his public statement in support of marriage and the impact it has made on some LGBT New Yorkers—and possibly Senators.

The New York Times has a thought-provoking story on the LGBT movement’s lack of a national leader, including an interview with David Eisenbach – author of “Gay Power: An American Revolution,” one of our favorite books chronicling New York’s gay rights history.

New Jersey Gov. Corzine is making his support of marriage for same-sex couples a key issue in his re-election campaign.

Same-sex couples who report themselves as married will be counted as such in the 2010 Census. This reverses the old policy of overwriting such responses and calling these couples “unmarried partners.”

Hundreds of formerly Episcopal parishes are meeting this week to unify as a new national church called the Anglican Church in North America. The church will exclude women and LGBT people from serving as bishops.

An unusual ban that prohibited a Georgia man from bringing his partner or gay friends around his children was unanimously overturned by the state’s Supreme Court.